It is common practice to test electronic components prior to their actually being installed. In the process, components are subjected to extreme conditions, greater than those they will experience in actual usage to weed out weak or defective parts. For example, it is not uncommon to test a component for hours, if not days, under temperature conditions approaching 85.degree. C. Such testing is referred to as burning-in. There are a number of burn-in systems in use today. However, they tend to be very expensive because they are generally custom designed and dedicated only to a particular component or circuit to be tested. Applicants have been making customized burn-in racks for the electronics industry for some time which are designed specifically and wired precisely in accordance with the tests planned for the units to be tested. A system designed and hand wired to a specific component or circuit is known as a "dedicated" system.
Racks containing the units to be tested, are placed in temperature controlled chambers. The racks are wired into electronic test equipment which is usually outside the chamber in a separate control room. The control room contains a power source and various types of analytical equipment. In the prior art racks, the units under test are inserted directly into each rack. Thousands of wires connect the units under test to the power source.
Generally, after a period of time (a year or so), the user changes the specific product being tested because a new product has come along and replaced the earlier one, or the specific product has been modified. The only way to insert and test such a new product is to completely redesign or modify the rack wiring. This involves desoldering and complete refrabrication, often times costing in the hundreds of thousands of dollars in labor.
An object of the present invention is to provide a rack which is completely reusable requiring no desoldering and which is completely nondedicated to any particular unit to be tested.
It is also an object that the racks be completely adaptable to any unit to be tested and wherein two or more different units can simultaneously be tested without altering the wiring connecting the rack to the test equipment.